Facebook to roll out ad transparency rules ahead of European election

Facebook will implement tools to make political advertising more transparent during the upcoming European Parliament election, including so-called issue ads, the company announced Monday.

“In late March, we will launch new tools to help prevent interference in the upcoming election and make political advertising on Facebook more transparent,” Nick Clegg, the company’s newly appointed VP for global affairs and communications, said at a Brussels event.

Facebook, Google and Twitter have been under intense scrutiny from the European Commission to help prevent foreign interference, especially from Russia, in the European election in May.

Facebook's tools will be largely modeled after those implemented during the U.S. midterm election.

People and organizations wishing to run political ads will need to be authorized by the platform and all ads will have to contain “paid for by” disclaimers, Clegg said.

Issue-based ads, which attempt to influence voters on an issue such as immigration rather than pull them toward a particular candidate, will also be covered by those new rules. (Many political ads ahead of Britain’s Brexit referendum focused on issues rather than people or parties.)

The issues falling under the rules will be defined in cooperation with a network of academics. Facebook will also keep a library of ads.

“All the political ads will be stored in a publicly searchable library for up to seven years. The library will contain information on the ads' performance, like the amount of money spent and the number of impressions displayed, as well details of who paid for them and the demographics of those who saw them, including age, gender and location,” Clegg said.

A Dublin-based operations center focused on elections integrity will be set up in the spring.